In a steering rod of this kind, the guide rods or cross guides are safety parts which must not be so damaged by overload that in later operation they fail and may cause dangerous situations. It must also be assured that through such guide rods and cross guides, no uncontrolled high loads are transmitted which would lead to not clearly perceptible starting damage in connecting parts important to safety. For this reason, guide rod parts have been designed so that overloads, before a break or separation of material, would lead to such permanent deformation of the part that the overload which had taken place would be clearly perceptible to the user in the driving or steering behavior of the vehicle. Thus, pressure-stressed guide rod parts have been designed as bend struts which, at a definite pressure load, would bend away without separation of the part. Guide rod parts have also been pre-bent so that with too great a pressure load, they would bend farther and a clearly perceptible deformation would result in the driving behavior. In the case of guide rod parts which might be overstressed through a tension load, however, no comparable overload safety devices have become known.
However, from U.S. Pat. No. 2,757,028 is known a steering rod for motor vehicles. The steering rod has a guide rod of which the end engages in a tubular section of the same guide rod. A cylindrical rubber sleeve is set as shock damper between these two construction parts so as to absorb brief shocks as well as wheel vibrations.